British Institution - Patronage

Patronage

After the first exhibition the gallery was kept open as a free school for artists, with members lending a variety of Old Masters for them to copy; at this stage the public could not see these displays. From 1807 a number of prizes of £100 or £50 were given to students at the school who painted the best companion pieces to works by Old Masters on display at the gallery. These were later increased and extended to other artists, reaching 300, 200 and 100 guineas by 1811.

The Institution commissioned or bought a number of paintings which were presented to the National Gallery, and some other institutions. In 1826 they presented the Vision of Saint Jerome or Madonna and Child with Saints by Parmigianino (bought in 1823 for £3,302), the Consecration of Saint Nicholas by Paolo Veronese (bought in 1811 for £1,575), and in 1830 the Market Cart by Thomas Gainsborough (bt 1829, Lord Gwydir's Sale, 1050 gn) and a Holy Family by Reynolds (same, 1950 gn.). Modern works included Benjamin West's Christ Healing the Sick in the Temple, for which the very high price of 3,000 guineas was paid, though this was more than recouped by sales of an engraving commissioned by the Institution. It was given to the National Gallery, but later transferred along with their British collection to what is now Tate Britain. In 1814 Mary annointing the Feet of Christ by William Hilton was bought for 550 gn. and given to a church in the City. and the following year 1,000 gn was set aside for premiums for oil sketches of subjects showing "the successes of the British Army in Spain, Portugal or France", producing many submissions the following year, for which two 150 gn. premiums were awarded, and James Ward commissioned for 1,000 gn to do a full-size version of his Allegory of Waterloo. Another Waterloo work was given to the Royal Hospital, Chelsea. Other religious paintings were bought for London churches, and a new competition announced for two works on Nelson's victories to be given to Greenwich Hospital. In 1826 the Institution announced that nearly £5,000 in premiums, and over £14,000 on purchases had been spent to date, but from the 1830s the number and size of premiums slackens and the last premiums were in 1842, after which sums like £50 were given to artists' charities instead, and in later years no donations are recorded. In 1850 the Institution recorded a total of £28,515 in purchases, prizes and donations since 1806. By the 1850s the overall prosperity of the market for contemporary paintings had hugely increased.